Undergraduate / 'Problems are an inherent component of any society' - Princeton Common Application Supplement Essay [3]

The world limit is 650, and I'm currently at 876. I'd like to know what you guys think is best that I should keep (and maybe even expand on) and what is worse that I should delete. I'm not too concerned with grammar, although if you'd like to point out grammatical issues, feel free. I'm concerned most about the content and what kind of perception you get from the essay. If you were an admissions counselor, what would your impression of me be? Also, if you had to put my answer to the prompt into one sentence, what would it be? (This gives me a feel for if my answer to the prompt conveys what I want to convey). The prompt and essay are below. Thank you!

Prompt:In addition to the essay you have written for the Common Application, please write an essay of about 500 words (no more than 650 words and no less than 250 words). Using one of the themes below as a starting point, write about a person, event, or experience that helped you define one of your values or in some way changed how you approach the world. Please do not repeat, in full or in part, the essay you wrote for the Common Application.

2. "One of the great challenges of our time is that the disparities we face today have more complex causes and point less straightforwardly to solutions." Omar Wasow, Assistant Professor, Politics; Founder, (website removed) This quote is taken from Professor Wasow's January 2014 speech at the Martin Luther King Day celebration at Princeton University.

Problems are an inherent component of any society, but the problems themselves are not the biggest issues we face. Our greatest challenge is finding an effective way to go about solving, discussing, and debating those problems. Without a strong strategy for discourse and resolution, no problem can be solved in today's society where almost everything is controversial.

I became interested in dispute resolution and problem solving strategies as a result of exploring ways to implement libertarian solutions. The essence of libertarian problem solving is rectifying issues without government, which starkly contrasts the way in which we usually go about solving problems today - through government. As someone interested in debating important issues and advocating for my preferred solutions, knowing the best strategy for doing so is crucial.

I have followed the work of libertarian anti-war activist, author, politician, journalist, and protestor Adam Kokesh for quite some time. Kokesh has done it all in terms of advocating for a free society. He has campaigned for state office in New Mexico, organized protests, interviewed prominent figures, engaged in numerous acts of civil disobedience, written a book, and even disrupted John McCain's acceptance of the Republican nomination.

Out of all of these means of persuasion, I found Kokesh's interviews, videos, and writings about the issues to be the most effective. His relentless explanations of taxation being theft, war being immoral, and government being the monopoly on the initiation of force resonated with me. Ultimately, it was the discourse and absorbing of information that shifted my ideology towards libertarianism - not the protests or civil disobedience. I certainly enjoyed Kokesh's acts of civil disobedience, but that was only because I was already convinced of the libertarian message of universal non-violence. For example, Kokesh loaded a gun in Washington, D.C. on the fourth of July in direct defiance of the District's ban on firearms. I, along with other like-minded individuals, saw a victimless crime and justified act of civil disobedience. Others simply saw an extremist nut that deserved to go to jail.

The ramifications of Kokesh's actions were severe. He spent six months in jail, four of which were in isolation. He planned on fighting the gun charges in court in an attempt to get a jury to nullify the law, but ended up pleading guilty and accepting a suspended sentence after facing 15 years in prison - the potential risk was just too high.

After immersing myself in the gamut of Kokesh's work and analyzing the consequences of each of his actions, I made some realizations about the ways in which we go about advocating for certain solutions. Trying to make a change by defying laws, disrupting others, or provoking government isn't going to accomplish anything. All it does is disturb the majority of people and weaken the activist's credibility. Think back to Kokesh's gun-related civil disobedience. The only way he would've been able to get a jury to nullify the law is if public opinion was already on his side, and it clearly wasn't. Instead of convincing his opponents, he landed himself a jail sentence and drew the ire of the media and citizens of D.C. While he may have rallied supporters, it's impossible to lead a group from a cell in solitary confinement.

If there's anything to learn from Kokesh's ordeal as a provocateur, it's that confrontational and combative ways of persuasion are ineffective. This fall, Kokesh decided to spurn his past as an instigative activist and transition towards fundamentally changing the way people think about government. To do so, he plans on spending 2015 living out of an RV and touring 150 American cities to promote his book, Freedom, and returning to his most effective way of persuasion (the way which convinced me) - directly interacting with the public, interviewing people, and making compelling verbal and written arguments.

We can apply Kokesh's lesson to more than just spreading libertarian ideology. Many individuals, groups, and organizations are attempting to solve today's problems through combative and provocative means. Workers illegally block roads to protest higher wages. Individuals upset with Darren Wilson's acquittal chain shut mall doors on Black Friday and loot and destroy businesses. All of these actions are futile when it comes to changing public opinion. If someone disagrees with an activist's point, they're not going to see the activist's law-breaking or destructive behavior as justified.

If we want to do more than just rally our allies, we have to switch away from poking back at our opponents, seeking revenge, and aggressively protesting. In order to get what we want, public opinion has to be on our side. No matter how right or wrong revolutionaries may be, they are always going to be seen as aggressors in the wrong as long as the status quo shapes public opinion. In order to solve society's most complex problems, we have to change the status quo, not fight it. Fighting back is easy - it's our knee-jerk instinct. Dissolving that instinct and relentlessly writing, speaking, and advocating for a solution is much harder, but it is necessary. The solutions to today's toughest problems aren't going to arise as a result of infantile fighting - they're going to emerge as the product of years of hard work, where society's best minds strive to change and mold public opinion.

Undergraduate / A mix between a "central identity" story and "challenging an idea" - Common Application Essay [3]

I wrote this essay back in June for a class assignment, although the topic is definitely something I'd consider writing about when I go to submit the common application in a few months. My safety school (UW-Madison) is not on the common application, so I can afford to be bold with this essay in an attempt to gain admission into low match/stretch schools.

Usually politics is considered off limits for admissions essays, but politics is a large part of my identity. I don't need any feedback in terms of grammar; rather, I'm interested in what you guys think about the idea in general.

Here's the list of schools my common app essay will go to: Cornell, Pennsylvania, Princeton, Washington in St. Louis, Northwestern, and Georgetown (so far).

The essay:

Far too many young adults these days reject political and philosophical ideologies. They simply accept the world as it is and have no desire to change things. I personally, however, cannot be separated from political and philosophical ideology - I constantly seek the truth. In the last few years of my life, I have spent a great deal of time defining, establishing, and arguing for my political and moral values. I constantly challenge ideas, and as a result, I am at the ideological point I'm at today.

I first became interested in the political arena during Wisconsin's Act 10 chaos of 2011. I remember watching "The Ed Show" every evening during the thick of the action and agreeing wholeheartedly with the host's views. I was essentially an MSNBC liberal, and a rather ignorant one.

That's okay though. There's nothing wrong with being "wrong", as long as you continue to challenge your ideas and seek the truth. Obviously, the "truth" I speak of is immensely subjective, but I personally believe that everyone can and should be able to realize the truth that I have. The intellectual journey begins.

I don't remember why, but I began to challenge my narrow-sighted liberal beliefs by watching Paul Ryan videos on YouTube. I can still picture Ryan arguing for a tax code that is "fair, simple, and competitive". I don't think Ryan's ideas enthralled me, but they served as a means of reaching the ideas of Ron Paul, which I found to be really exciting.

I'm so deep in the ideology that I'm not sure what set me off in terms of adopting values similar to those of Ron Paul. Perhaps it was his passion or his impeccable voting record, but I suspect that it was the simplicity and coherence of his libertarian values. The idea that people should be able to do whatever they'd like as long as they don't infringe on the rights of others resonated with me. Paul's exposure of the failures of the monetary system also intrigued me. I was shocked at how we could allow a central bank to dictate the economy and consequently our fate. His "blowback" theory of foreign policy made perfect sense. I now considered myself a "libertarian", but definitely not an anarchist... How things would change.

I then stumbled upon the works of Adam Kokesh. He takes libertarianism to an extreme, arguing that as a result of the non-aggression principle, government can't legitimately exist. One of his favorite things to do is interview people and question them until they realize taxation is theft unless the government owns us. I remember trying to reject this notion as much as I could, but it just wasn't possible. There is no way to argue against complete voluntarism since anything else advocates violence, and violence is something that we universally reject. Looking back now, I realize that I held on to statism simply out of the fears I had with the connotations of being an anarchist, anarcho-capitalist, or full out libertarian. As a society, we associate these terms with lunacy, and as a result, I was a bit reluctant to accept them.

I'm at the point now where I believe government cannot morally exist since it isn't a voluntary agreement between people. If we have the right to be free from violence, government automatically breaks that right by claiming the ability to initiate force on us, even if that use of force is decided by a majority vote. I don't claim to know exactly how a truly free society would work, but I am convinced as far as the moral logic goes.

It's been a quick few years, and I've gone from being a liberal to being a libertarian or anarcho-capitalist. In college, I will enjoy challenging my ideas, both introspectively, and also through engaging with my peers and professors.

End Essay

Thanks for reading. I'll be glad to help out all of you with your essays as well!